(I apologize with the delay! I got this one twice so I put it off for a little while. To my other requesters, I have 7 or 8 more BTHB requests to fill. So so sorry if yours has been delayed forever! I have gotten stuck on a few of these!!)
He was back. The dark, horned creature loomed in the rectangle of light that was the entry to her car as Rasia peaked out from below her arm and between the bars of her cage. Thick, iron bars, that despite the red caking of rust, were stronger than even her coils could crush. But the assistant was not as strong as iron, she suspected.
She didn’t respond, as planned. Her head hidden below pale arms patched with scales, molted yellow tail curled tightly in a ball that kept her half hidden against the rough wooden floor.
There was a shuffle as he knelt outside the cage, she stayed silent, eyes closed. His hand pressed the thickest bend of her tail to wake her, smooth scales flexing before he jerked away, as if expecting her to lash out, again. Her teeth ground together, trying her hardest to stay still and silent.
After another moment, her persistence was rewarded. The clink of his many keys, the grate of the lock, the creak of the door. She tensed, scales shifting with a slithering scrape in anticipation. He paused at the door, perhaps considering fetching the other one, the human, the angry one. No, no. Come in, come closer.
Evidently, he decided he could handle her “sickness” on his own, as he knelt, crawling towards her on the hay that scattered the floor. He didn’t notice the end of her yellow molten tail camouflaged below the coarse straw, didn’t notice as it slid towards his ankle.
His hand touched her shoulder, clawed fingers tipped back to keep off her skin. Her arm moved back, revealing her face. Pale red eyes snapped opened, narrow pupils dilating in the light. Perhaps then, he knew he had been tricked.
The end of her tail curled around his ankle, yanking him backwards. The assistant collapsed on top her with a cry as his leg was taken out from below him. Her body twisted, bending over him, curling in a lazy but deadly coil around his chest, trapping his arms to his sides. The horned one managed to scream, or, more precisely, squawk with surprise, before her constricting form crushed around his chest, stealing the air to make anymore noise.
She could have killed him, easily. But she was not like them. Instead her hands grabbed the bars, dragging herself forward with half her body still wrapped around him. He rolled below her, pressed against the floor as she shifted from the back corner to the cage door left open. Freedom laid only a few feet of wooden floor away.
A shadow crossed the door and she recoiled, the assistant choking behind her as her coils tightened in apprehension. The human stood at the door, one hand on the frame, the other reaching towards the whip at his side. Rasia hissed sharply, coiling, bending, shifting backwards over the assistant until he was between her and the human.
This did not stop the Ringmaster from moving into the traincar. She constricted and the assistant groaned. The human stepped closer and she coiled tighter in response, feeling the assistant’s bones grate in her grip. The threat, she thought, was clear. But he stepped forward again, seeming to not care about her crushing grip around his employee. She shifted back, coils curling and the assisted used the last of his air to cry sharply in pain.
She started at his command, loosening slightly and the horned creature took a shuttered, choked breath against her tail. The Ringmaster chuckled, the coiled whip tapping against his knee as if impatient for this stand off to be over.
“You thought you could use him as what, a hostage? And I would let you go?”
Rasia curled back further, back pressing against the bars of her former cage, regarding the man with suspicion and disbelief. Her body tightened again and the assistant let out a muffled keen.
“I can replace an assistant a lot easier than I can replace you, dear.”
She hissed, coiling tighter and he thrashed in her grip. A whimper of pain squeezed from him. She felt ligaments and bones shifting, twisting in an attempt to accommodate the crushing pressure. The snap of a rib.
One, then two. Crushed with an echoing crack in the space between her and her captor. The assistant went limp in her coils, though she could feel the frantic beat of his heart against her tail. The human only stood and watched, waiting. The smarmy grin plastered on his face as if he knew she could not go through with it. Or perhaps, really did not care at all if she did.
She could. His bones strained below her quivering coils, she could snap each one slowly, for the part the assistant had played in her imprisonment. She could crush him until his ribs punctured his lungs and he choked on his own blood. She could twist, snap him in two, his spine splintered, neck broken. She could…not.
Her coils loosened, face softening. The assistant coughed, rough and grating, breath wheezing into crushed lungs, broken ribs vibrating against her scales. Rasia uncoiled, sliding backwards, depositing the horned creature like driftwood, left by the ebb of a wave. The Ringmaster stepped over his crumpled form, herding his Lamia back into her cage with the still wound coil of his whip.
She could have. But she would not. She was not like them, she reminded herself. She was not a monster. In body, maybe to them, but not in mind.
“That is why you are the one in the cage,” the man said with a smile, as if he knew her thoughts, knew she was too weak to oppose his stronger will. He pushed the cage door shut with the clank of the lock. Then the Ringmaster turned, grabbing his assistant by the back of the coat, and dragged him out.
